Welcome to Can’t Wait for Wednesday, your guide to what’s coming to your local comic shop this week. Wednesday brings several big debuts, including a gonzo action comic from Curt Pires and Juan Gedeon, returns to the Last Ronin and Dark Knights of Steel universes, two new comics from Simon Spurrier and a Space Ghost annual that previews an upcoming Hanna-Barbara crossover that makes the nine-year-old in me squeal with glee.
I’ve pulled out some of the highlights for this week below, but for the complete list of everything you might find at your local comic shop and on digital this week, you’ll want to check out one or more of the following:
- Penguin Random House (Marvel + IDW + Dark Horse + more)
- Lunar Distribution (DC + Image + Mad Cave + more)
- ComicList (Pretty much all of the above)
- Amazon/Kindle + Neon Ichiban (digital comics)
As a reminder, things can change and what you find on the above lists may differ from what’s actually arriving in your local shop. So check with your retailer to see what’s arriving at their shop this week.
Super Mondo Mega Mutts #1 (Oni Press, $6.99): Curt Pires and Juan Gedeon team for this 40-page debut issue about four research animals transformed by a dimensional collision in downtown Los Angeles. Wolf, Frankee, Griffy and Freddy, named for Pires’ own dogs, now operate as radicalized anthropomorphic heroes bringing justice to streets overrun by militarized federal forces and alien-tech-powered gangs. Gedeon’s kinetic artwork is perfectly suited to the chaos; you can read my interview with him about the project here.
Dark Knights of Steel II #1 (DC, $4.99): Tom Taylor and artist Otto Schmidt return to the DC Elseworlds setting where a spaceship from a doomed planet crashlanded and changed everything for the sword-and-sorcery world. An ancient war is brewing beneath the waves, treasonous agents are hiding within the League’s own ranks and the darkest days of this high-fantasy DC universe are still ahead.
TMNT: The Last Ronin — Training Day (IDW, $7.99): Kevin Eastman, Tom Waltz and a team of artists fill in the story that didn’t make it into the original Last Ronin series: the single day Michelangelo had to compress a lifetime of training and wisdom into Casey Marie Jones before their battle against Oroku Hiroto.
Punisher vs. Spider-Man #1 (Marvel, $4.99): Dan Abnett and Matteo Della Fonte revisit the earliest encounters between two of New York City’s most notorious figures. Frank Castle and Peter Parker are forced into uneasy proximity by an ally from Frank’s past who needs their help.
Badrock #1 (Image, $3.99): Rob Liefeld and Seth Damoose spin the Youngblood member off into his own solo series. The youngest member of the world’s greatest super squad finds himself forced to comply with mysterious kidnappers when his mom is taken.
A Mischief of Magpies #1 (DSTLRY, $8.99): Here’s the first of two releases this week written by Simon Spurrier, as he and artist Matías Bergara launch a new DSTLRY series. Mar has a secret: sometimes, without warning, he falls out of the world entirely. Where he goes is an extraordinary city that is also a machine, endlessly crossing a shoreless ocean, split between bright bustling spires above the waves and beast-haunted twilight halls below.
Minotaur #1 (Ignition Press, $4.99): And in this second series, Spurrier teams with artist Michael Dowling for a science fiction thriller that was previewed earlier this year on Free Comic Book Day. Five years ago, a government supercomputer nearly triggered the Singularity before a failsafe pulled the plug, but something leaked in those first picoseconds, and now the future is fighting back through inexplicable events, miracles and monsters. Photojournalist Gloria Monday documents the people transformed by these outbreaks of the future, backed by ex-military muscle and a reformed tech bro funding their global mission.
Grendel: Devil’s Crucible — Sedition #1 (Dark Horse, $4.99): Matt Wagner continues his Devil’s Crucible miniseries saga, bringing together elements of various past Grendel series. The Hounds of Orion now have Grendel Prime back after a five-hundred-year absence, along with a clone of the second Grendel Christine Spar, and they’re ready to take the fight directly to the Necro-Lords.
Sonic the Hedgehog x Godzilla #1 (IDW, $4.99): Nick Marino and Jack Lawrence bring two of pop culture’s most beloved franchises together for this crossover. Mothra and Mechagodzilla burst through a dimensional fissure into Sonic’s world mid-battle, and Sonic, Amy and Tails have to figure out how to stop the city from being destroyed while Dr. Eggman schemes gleefully in the background.
Space Ghost Annual #1 (Dynamite, $5.99): David Pepose and Jonathan Lau pit Space Ghost and the Twins against master thief Magnus and his reality-warping alien partner, as they attempt to pull an impossible heist. The annual also serves as a prelude to the incoming Herculoids crossover. Check out my interview with Pepose about it (as well as other things) here.
What If…? Jessica Jones #1 (Marvel, $4.99): Justina Ireland and David Messina ask what would have happened if it was Jessica Jones and not Peter Parker who was bitten by the radioactive spider. Now retired from superheroics, Jessica is dragged back into action when the Green Goblin returns.
Kingdom of Earth #1 (Dark Horse, $4.99): Co-writers David Dastmalchian and Leah Kilpatrick team with artist Soo Lee to launch this monster survival series set two years after hordes of monsters devoured most of humanity and then realized they needed humans alive. Young Frankie narrowly escapes becoming livestock and discovers that surviving in this world is far harder than it seemed.
Mister Nemo #1 (Mad Cave, $4.99): Mark London and Alden Kaye launch another chapter of the Underworld Universe as a brilliant analyst uncovers a global conspiracy, gets immediately marked for disappearance and is rescued by the mysterious Nemo, who is waging a secret war from beneath the ocean.
Fear of Death: A Rachel Rising Story #1 (Abstract Studios, $5.99): Terry Moore goes back to the origins of Rachel Rising as 10-year-old Zoe witnesses a brutal murder, the angel of Death arrives to collect spirits, Lilith attempts to negotiate and fails, and the events that will eventually become the story of Rachel Rising are set in motion.
Zero Instance #1 (ComiXology Originals, $2.99): Frank Barbiere and Stephen Rhodes are both veterans of the video game world, and now they’ve teamed to write a five-issue thriller about an MMO raid that goes sideways when the game’s final boss appears to break free into the real world. An experimental AI called Braxir begins manipulating connected technology and human behavior, and what was a game is suddenly something much more dangerous. Artist Vic Malhotra draws the first two issues.
Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas: All Hail the Pumpkin King #1 (Tokyopop, $4.99): Joshua Pruett continues the story of young Jack Skellington’s early days as Pumpkin King, as his first Halloween is approaching and he’s determined to prove himself worthy of the title. But then he makes the catastrophically bad decision to enlist a still-embittered Oogie Boogie to help.
Banana Number One #1 (Bad Idea, $5.99): Writer Joshua Dysart, artist Kevin Maguire, colorist Rico Renzi, and cover artist Michael Allred introduce what may be the year’s most gloriously deranged premise: a seven-foot-tall sentient banana who has been raised in secret, then became a race car driver, a sex symbol, a global celebrity, and is now becoming a revolutionary icon caught between human civilization and an impending fruit rebellion.
Foundations (Dark Horse, $7.99): Jonathan Hickman, Nick Spencer, Mike Del Mundo and Mike Huddleston bring their intergalactic-scale science fiction saga to print, following years of building their universe out on Substack. When astronaut Tajo Vallar undertakes a doomed expedition to a mysterious dormant moon, it triggers a war between magic and science.
Star Wars Visions: Tsukumo (VIZ, $14.99): Eiichi Shimizu and Tomohiro Shimoguchi, the creative team behind Knights of Sidonia, bring their distinctive manga sensibility to the Star Wars universe, following Jedi Knight Nagi Tsukumo in the aftermath of Order 66. Betrayed, poisoned and on the run with two droid outcasts searching for a fabled Droid Paradise, Tsukumo has an Imperial assassin closing in and a final destination that may demand the ultimate sacrifice.
Super Unicorn Princess (Penguin Workshop, $13.99): Mike Hartigan introduces S.U.P., a superhero in a frilly pink dress who protects Horizon City from ice cream monsters, ancient undead mummies and mutant alien slugs across three different stories.
Sama Crushes the Code (Candlewick, $14.99): Written by 17-year-old tech entrepreneur Samaira Mehta and illustrated by Jenny Alvarado, this middle-grade graphic novel follows Sama into her first year of Tech Club, where she proposes a project to help a bus driver optimize her route, only to be told it’s not complex enough. The solution involves a bunny-based coding game and a new friend who builds hovercrafts.
Fault Lines (Ablaze, $19.99): Emmy-nominated animation veteran Robert Cullen delivers three interconnected stories spanning three cities and three decades: a struggling singer-songwriter in Blackpool drawn into an ominous magical act, a mother in Vancouver recounting her life and death, and a widower in Edinburgh confronting lifelong guilt.
Across the Widest Sea (Mad Cave, $19.99): Jean Cremers writes and draws this metaphorical coming-of-age story about a girl who was abandoned in the middle of the ocean by her parents to fend for herself. She joins forces with Balthazar, a teenager whose canoe is taking on water, and Agathe, who has given up hope of ever reaching shore.
Champion of the Rose (VIZ, $16.99): Cat Aquino and Dominique Duran team for this bold, anti-imperialist fantasy epic rooted in the colonial history of Spain and the Philippines. Princess Rosa, desperate to win her own throne in her father’s gladiatorial tournament, chooses Rey, a trans swordsman from the colonized territory of Himala, as her champion. Rey wants only his freedom and revenge. What they both want is about to collide with what the empire demands.
Archibald the Monster Slayer (Ablaze, $14.99): Writer/artist Kim Hyun-Min introduces Archibald, a shy and observant boy with dreams of becoming a supernatural detective, who gets his wish when a talkative one-eyed dog named Monk pulls him into the Monster Investigation Bureau. Giant snakes, black mages, zombie armies, warring werewolves and bear-men, and harassed trolls all follow. Funny, charming, and genuinely inventive all-ages adventure.